Βιβλία σαν το «Τζακ»

Ὤ, διατί ἐστάθην τόσον τρελλός, τόσον ἀνόητος! Διατί ν’ ἀσωτεύσω καὶ ἐξευτελίσω τοὺς θησαυροὺς τῆς νεαρᾶς καρδίας μου; Τί καρδία! Τόσον εὐαίσθητος! Τόσον πλουσία! Ἀλλὰ καὶ τόσον ἄπειρος, τόσον ἀπρονόητος! Δὲν διεχειρίσθη περιεσκεμμένως τὴν δαψίλειαν τῶν αἰσθημάτων, δι’ ὧν ὁ Θεὸς τὴν ἐπροίκισεν! Ἡ ὑπερβολὴ τῆς ἐν αὐτῇ ἀγάπης τὴν ἐπίεζεν, ἡ πλημμύρα τὴν ἐστενοχώρει! Εἶχεν ἀνάγκην νὰ ἐκχειλίσῃ, νὰ ἐλαφρυνθῇ. Καὶ ὅταν προῆλθεν ἐνώπιον τῆς ἡ πρόστυχος ἐκείνη κόρη, δὲν ἠρώτησε, δὲν ἐσκέφθη νὰ κάμῃ οἰκονομίαν. Οἰκονομίαν! Καὶ ἦτο δυνατόν; Ἐπίστευεν ὅτι ἠγαπᾶτο. Ὅσῳ περισσότερα ἔδιδε, τόσα περισσότερα θὰ ἐλάμβανεν. Καὶ μετήγγισα λοιπὸν ὅλους τοὺς θησαυροὺς τῶν αἰσθημάτων εἰς τὴν εὐτελῆ της καρδίαν, εἰς τὸ ἀνάξιον, τὸ ῥυπαρὸν ἐκεῖνο σκεῦος, διὰ νὰ λάβω... ἀτιμίαν, ἐξουθένωσιν. Ἐθεοποίησα τὴν ταπείνωσιν, ἐλάτρευσα τὴν ἀσχημίαν! Τώρα τί ὑψηλὸν νὰ σκεφθῶ πλέον διὰ τὴν Κλάραν, τὸ ὁποῖον νὰ μὴ ἐξηυτέλισα προσκεφθεὶς δι’ ἐκείνην; Τί ὡραῖον, τὸ ὁποῖον νὰ μὴ προησχημίσθη συγχρωτισθὲν μετ’ ἐκείνης;

Long before anybody else was astir he arose and stole softly downstairs. The sunlight was stealing in at every crevice, and flashing in long streaks across the darkened rooms. The dining-room into which he looked struck chill and cheerless in the dark yellow light which came through the lowered blinds. He remembered that it had the same appearance when his father lay dead in the house; now, as then, everything seemed ghastly and unreal; the very chairs standing as their occupants had left them the night before seemed to be indulging in some dark communication of ideas.

Am I, then, immortal? This is a question which I have asked myself, by day and night, for now three hundred and three years, and yet cannot answer it. I detected a grey hair amidst my brown locks this very day—that surely signifies decay. Yet it may have remained concealed there for three hundred years—for some persons have become entirely white-headed before twenty years of age.

After the deceptions and illusions of the torture-chamber, the precision of the details of that quiet little middle-class room seemed to have been invented for the express purpose of puzzling the mind of the mortal rash enough to stray into that abode of living nightmare. The wooden bedstead, the waxed mahogany chairs, the chest of drawers, those brasses, the little square antimacassars carefully placed on the backs of the chairs, the clock on the mantelpiece and the harmless-looking ebony caskets at either end, lastly, the whatnot filled with shells, with red pin-cushions, with mother-of-pearl boats and an enormous ostrich-egg, the whole discreetly lighted by a shaded lamp standing on a small round table: this collection of ugly, peaceable, reasonable furniture, AT THE BOTTOM OF THE OPERA CELLARS, bewildered the imagination more than all the late fantastic happenings.

Ὅλοι ἐγέλασαν, καὶ ἡ γερόντισσα τοὺς ἐμιμήθη. Ἠγέρθη φοροῦσα τὸν στέφανον, ὅστις ἐταίριαζεν ὡς ὀξύμωρον σχῆμα ἐπὶ τῆς μαύρης μανδήλας της, καὶ ἐκόσμει τὰ ἄσπρα τσουλούφια της, τοὺς μακροὺς θυσάνους τῶν τριχῶν, τοὺς κρεμαμένους ἀπὸ τῶν μηνίγγων ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ὤτων, καὶ ἤρχισε νὰ καμαρώνῃ τάχα ὡσὰν νύφη.

Why did I remain silent and motionless while such an outrage was being committed? If, instead of being a very nervous girl, preoccupied with an undefinable terror of that wicked woman, I had possessed courage and presence of mind, I dare say I might have given an alarm, and escaped from the room without the slightest risk. But so it was; I could no more stir than the bird who, cowering under its ivy, sees the white owl sailing back and forward under its predatory cruise.